No, Really: What Does "Organic" Mean?
If that last post allowed me to pose challenging philosophical questions and wax melodic about my mother, it sure didn’t offer many answers. Thanks for that indulgence, but this blog is Hard-Hitting and Educational, too, so without further ado, here’s today’s Lesson: What, In Fact, Does The Word Organic Mean?
(A marketing service that doesn’t come straight out and say its products are better? Oh, right, we’re dealing with government. ‘Course, we all know the truth…)
According to the rules, organic land can’t have had prohibited substances applied to it for at least three years before the harvest. (This list is constantly amended, and those with rather vested interests tend to be the ones most constantly amending it.) Organic crops are raised without using most conventional pesticides, petroleum-based fertilizers, or sewage sludge-based fertilizers, or any genetic engineering and ionizing radiation. Contrary to popular opinion, pesticides are frequently used: options include copper, ryania, sabadilla and rotenone (anyone who’s ever tried to grow tomatoes can vouch for the near-impossibility of keeping them pest-free through good will alone).
Processed foods labeled 100% Organic must be made with 100% organic ingredients; those labeled Organic must be 95% organic. That is, unless an ingredient isn’t commercially available in organic form (another giant loophole). Other labeling options include Made With Organic Ingredients (for which organic composition must reach 70%) and Some Organic Ingredients (for products that are less than 70% organic).
The rules that define organics are an unremitting work in progress, a push-and-pull between all the different lobbies who stand to profit from re-definitions, shifting standards and looser vs. tighter accreditation processes. And while recently there’s been a lot of grumbling about the Big Guys’ co-optation of organics (a topic we’ll revisit), scrutinizing the rules shows that, even given loopholes, our land and our bodies benefit a great deal from going organic.
On Friday, we’ll talk about raising organic animals. See you then!
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.plentymag.com/blog-mt1/mt-tb.cgi/1060
Comments
I know it's difficult for people, who were not one of the hundreds of people who worked tirelessly for years to develop the Organic standards, to understand that many of the decisions made about Organic standards were very pragmatic.
While 100% Organic sounds good, if you take into account the fact that Baking Powder is a synthetic,(on the National List), then almost all baked goods and mixes could not be labeled as organic. That is why there is a 95% rule.
Commercial Availability has been contentious, but is now coming under control with the help of the National Organic Program and Organic Certifiers.
As far as the groups working on the regulations, most of the time it's the same faces with similar arguments.
Yes there are big corporate players now but they have had a very low profile in changes to Organics. (There was the Georgia chicken company that wanted to water down the organic feed rules but they got squashed) Wanting to use materials such as yeast is very understandable since the National Organic Standards Board has for years refused to list yeast as an Organic ingredient. (It is an arcane argument about whether yeast is actually live-stock under the current definitions of Organic)
Back in the 80's the discussion around Organics was; stay small or grow big. The majority of farmers decided that if we were to save the earth from conventional farming, Organics would have to accommodate larger farms.
Most of the Organic arguments today are still based on that original schism.
So Organic means that consumers have a choice about the food they eat.
Posted by:Organic George |February 14, 2007 4:54 PM